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Kiril watched Angul flickering, dimming with each heartbeat. Without her touch to enliven the half-soul, the Blade Cerulean's fires would fail. All her personal angst and troubles, tied directly to the blade, would cease, or at least no longer continue to grow. She could finally get on with her life. An image of her enchanted whisky flask appeared in her mind's eye. "No, I wouldn't. . ." She hoped she wouldn't.

Was Angul so much to give up? He was not Nangulis, after all—he was only a distorted image of Nangulis's overriding conviction, purpose, and duty as a Keeper. Angul, for all his power to destroy aberrations, was also a self-proclaimed justicar of all that was right, rather than a solver of problems. As Kiril had learned early in her career as Angul's wielder, such certitude can quickly lend itself to right's opposite. She'd cursed the blade enough, blaming Angul for her long exile from Stardeep and her lapse as a Keeper of the Cerulean Sign. The blade was anathema to her. Her chance to forget required only that she turn away.

The memory of Nangulis kneeling before her, his palm on her face, flashed before her. The warmth of his hand still haunted her cheek, he had touched her so recently; or his shade had. Did it matter? More importantly, could she truly live without him? Could she gainsay Angul, the last remnant of the love of someone who meant more to her than her own miserable life?

Leave him, she commanded herself. If she touched the guttering blade, she would be lost—the only opportunity she'd ever have to be shut of Angul's temerity was now before her. Who knows what future pain she might inflict upon herself and others as a thrall to the blade's righteousness?

No, better to walk away from the lip, bid him . . .

Good-bye.

"Farewell, Nangulis . . ." Her head fell as she imagined the rest of the day, the rest of the month, and the remainder of the year. She attempted to picture the rest of her life, however long it might stretch into the gray, lonely future.

A desolate cry broke from Kiril Duskmourn. She sprang forward, reaching for the Blade Cerulean's hilt. With a tug, the blade was free from the stone. Fire bloomed, sky blue and joyous. Angul burned anew and gladly in her loving grip. Angul's clarity of reason fell across her like a warm blanket. It was like . . . coming home.

"Angul," she whispered, her face transfigured. "I missed you."